Jesus of Nazareth: What He Wanted, Who He Was

1. Cf. Rudolf Pesch, Das Markusevangelium, Part 2, HTKNT II/2 (Freiburg: Herder, 1977), 21.

2. Cf. Gerhard Lohfink, Das Vaterunser neu ausgelegt, Urfelder Reihe 7 (Bad Tölz: Verlag Urfeld, 2007), 29–34. Still fundamental is Joachim Jeremias, Abba. Studien zur neutestamentlichen Theologie und Zeitgeschichte (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1966), 15–67. Available in English in idem, Jesus and the Message of the New Testament, ed. K. C. Hanson (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2002), esp. 39–74.

3. Ps 11:6; Isa 51:17, 22; Ezek 23:32-33.

4. Cf. Martin Hengel and Anna Maria Schwemer, Jesus und das Judentum (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007), 588. The references for Celsus and Julian can also be found there.

5. Cf. in the Old Testament the distress of the prophet Jeremiah (e.g., Jer 20:7-18) and in the New Testament Paul’s statements about himself (e.g., 2 Cor 4:7-18).

6. Thus, probably correctly, John 18:12-15.

7. Thus Hengel and Schwemer, Jesus und das Judentum, 593.

8. Cf. esp. Josef Blinzler, The Trial of Jesus: The Jewish and Roman Proceedings against Jesus Christ Described and Assessed from the Oldest Accounts (Westminster, MD: Newman Press, 1959), 117–21; also 86–89. In my description of Jesus’ last day I am grateful to be able to follow this foundational work in many details.

9. Cf. in the Old Testament: Num 35:30; Deut 17:6; 19:15.

10. Thus Mark 8:29-30; 9:7-9.

11. The suggestion that Jesus did not use the Son of Man title is utterly unfounded. It appears in the New Testament almost nowhere but on the lips of Jesus. And later Christology had no idea what to do with the title. Cf. the persuasive and well-considered presentation in Hengel and Schwemer, Jesus und das Judentum, 526–41; see also chap. 19 below.

12. Cf. m. Sanh. VII, 5. The command, however, is older than the law in the Mishnah: cf. 2 Kgs 18:37–19:1.

13. There is no basis in the Markan text for two different meetings of the Council; it is also improbable that the Sanhedrin only assembled in the early morning, as supposed by Willibald Bösen, Der letzte Tag des Jesus von Nazaret. Was wirklich geschah (Freiburg: Herder, 1994), 174–77.

14. An overview of the shifting discussion on this point can be found in Pesch, Markusevangelium, Part 2, 418–19.

15. In the Fourth Gospel account Jesus’ scourging precedes the death sentence (John 19:1; cf. Luke 23:16). In that case it would have been a final attempt on the part of Pilate to avoid sentencing Jesus to death.

16. See b. Sanh. 43a: “When one is led out to execution, he is given a goblet of wine containing a grain of frankincense, in order to benumb his senses, for it is written, Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto the bitter in soul” (Sanhedrin, trans. Jacob Schachter and Harry Freedman, ed. Isidore Epstein [London: Soncino, 1987]).

17. Thus Hengel and Schwemer, Jesus und das Judentum, 617; Schalom ben Chorin, Brother Jesus: The Nazarene through Jewish Eyes (Atlanta: University of Georgia Press, 2001), 184.

18. 11Q Temple 64, 6-10. Cf. Peter Stuhlmacher, Biblische Theologie des Neuen Testaments 1 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1992), 155–56.

Chapter 18

1. Only in the so-called canonical ending of Mark (Mark 16:9-20), which, however, stems from the second century, is anything said (at v. 14) about the eleven (disciples).

2. Since there is probably an existing tradition behind John 16:32 the redactional tension with John 20, in which the disciples remain in Jerusalem after all, need not exclude this interpretation.

3. See in detail Gerhard Lohfink, Die Himmelfahrt Jesu. Untersuchungen zu den Himmelfahrts- und Erhöhungstexten bei Lukas, SANT 26 (Munich: Kösel, 1971), 262–65.

4. Cf. Luke 24:6 (which retains a reminiscence of Galilee) with Mark 16:7.

5. “Disclosure situation” is the phrase used by Ian T. Ramsey, Wilhelmus A. de Pater, and others. It refers to a moment in which, through a concrete event, a new view of things suddenly appears. For extensive discussion, see Tullio Aurelio, Disclosures in den Gleichnissen Jesu. Eine Anwendung der disclosure-Theorie von I. T. Ramsey, der modernen Metaphorik und der Theorie der Sprechakte auf die Gleichnisse Jesu, RST 8 (Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 1977), 28–41.